Special Edition -- June 14, 2007

Cornell University announces $450 million in campaign gifts

NEW YORK -- Weill Cornell Medical College's (WCMC) "Discoveries That Make a Difference" capital campaign reached the halfway point of its $1.3 billion goal with the announcement June 13 of $400 million in campaign gifts. An additional $50 million for life sciences research on the Ithaca campus was announced at the same time.

The largest portion of the gifts to Weill Cornell is $250 million from Joan and Sanford I. Weill, chairman of WCMC's Board of Overseers. Of that amount, $25 million will fund the Ithaca-based Joan and Sanford I. Weill Institute for Cell and Molecular Biology and its interdisciplinary research collaborations between WCMC and Cornell in Ithaca. The Weills also are giving an additional $50 million to help fund the Life Sciences Technology Building, currently under construction on the Ithaca campus. In recognition of their generosity, the building will be named Weill Hall. Taken together, the $300 million from the Weills is the largest gift Cornell University has ever received.

Maurice R. Greenberg, a member of the Weill Cornell Board of Overseers and chairman and CEO of C.V. Starr and Co., his wife, Corinne, and the Starr Foundation are giving $50 million, it was also announced. Another $100 million is coming from an anonymous donor.

The gifts bring WCMC's campaign total to $650 million and Cornell's comprehensive campaign, "Far Above ...," to a total of $1.653 billion. Both campaigns were launched in October 2006.

In the photo above, toasting to "friendship and partnership" are, from left, Cornell President David Skorton, Weill Cornell Medical College Dean Antonio Gotto, Sandy and Joan Weill, and Peter Meinig, chairman of the Cornell Board of Trustees, at the June 13 press conference in New York.

• Read about the press conference
• Watch the video of the press conference
• Institute for Cell and Molecular Biology benefits from $25 million gift
• New life sciences building to be named Weill Hall
• Weill Cornell and Ithaca campus research collaborations
• Weill Cornell's press release

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